To Stumble Through Life and Other Worlds
by FairyAlchemist400
Summary: A series of one-shots, rambles, and story ideas/segments — Current: Luffy's been trying over and over and over again. Exactly how many lifetimes has he been trying to save Ace?
1. What I feel Like With him Gone

**So, this series of stories will always be marked as complete since they're one-shots, but I will post other things.**

 **Obviously, I don't own One Piece...yet.**

* * *

Luffy was surrounded with people who loved him. His crew laying down in their own hammocks nearby. The sounds of their peaceful, sleeping bodies enveloped him in comfort and reassurance.

So, he didn't understand how he could still feel as though that gaping hole in heart was wider than ever. He felt so empty and yet so full. The pressure of his feelings threatened to rip their way out of him in the form of a piercing scream.

But he didn't want them to hear. He wanted them to know, but he didn't. Why couldn't they figure it out on their own? He didn't want to acknowledge it himself.

In a desperate attempt to hide his scalding emotions, he let a silent scream claw its way out. He didn't know that you could scream like that, without sound. He didn't care though. Luffy was just glad to feel a minute relief from the intense pressure that threatened to make his chest explode.

And then suddenly Luffy thought of _him_ again—the way _he_ would tease him lovingly and just sit by his side when he was too tired to continue on for the day—and another scream would bubble up inside him like boiling water. He silently let it out again, tears streaming down his now red face.

The chasm in his life wouldn't ever be fully filled. He remembered the way how _his_ blood covered his hands. The crushing despair and denial when no one could heal _him_. How _he_ died with a gaping hole in his chest, all for Luffy. He let out another silent wail.

And that was all he could do. He could ignore the pain during the day, hiding it behind grins and laughter. He used it to fool himself just as much as the others. However, when it was night and he was somehow so alone and yet surrounded by people, there was no masking it.

His only hope was that, one day, the pain would start to fade.


	2. In a World With You

**So, I feel like this type of entry will be the cruelest. Seeing as it's a story segment that may or may not ever become a finished piece :p However, if anyone would like to use this as inspiration, feel free to do so! Just tell me what it's called or send me a link or something, 'cause I'd love to read it! I'd appreciate it if you credited me, but I'm not going to go up in arms if you don't. Just don't copy it word for word, thanks!**

 **Also, I've permanently changed the title of the story from "What I Feel Like With him Gone" to "To Stumble Through Life and Other Worlds." Sorry if that causes any confusion (-。ー;)**

* * *

Luffy flew backwards at the impact of the attack. This guy was strong, but not strong enough to beat him. Luffy flung himself up in the air and launched another gatling attack. Suddenly, the man turned his head to the side before grimacing. The other Straw Hats were finally arriving.

The man looked back, staring Luffy straight in the eye as the latter flew towards him; he took the attack head on. "It's been fun kid, but I have to go."

The guy put his hand out and, as soon as Luffy made contact with him, the former vanished.

* * *

Luffy sat up with jolt, slamming his head into someone above him.

"Ow. . . fuck!" A voice hissed.

Unaffected, Luffy jumped forward and pinned the man to the ground. That stupid, cocky guy wasn't going to get away as easily as he thought he would!

However, the teen froze as he laid eyes on the person underneath him: Ace.

Someone suddenly ripped Luffy off of him; he didn't resist, too shell shocked to care. Luffy's brained turned its gears, trying to wrap his head around the situation. It took a second for the teen to rationalize that he must be dreaming. The man had knocked him out. That's what happened, because Ace was dead. No looking back at what he'd lost, he had to remember that.

Luffy's eyes slid over to the one who had grabbed him and his jaw went slack. It was himself. "There's another me!"

The other-him was frowning at him. "Why'd you attack Ace, me?"

"I didn't notice it was him!" Luffy defended, eyes moving back to his dead brother.

He watched as his sibling stood up, rubbing his forehead. Luffy marveled at how clear he looked, with his dreams not tending to be so incredibly vivid. . . Luffy frowned. "It's bad for me to be dreaming like this."

Ace looked at him in bemusement. "What?"

Luffy bit his lip and snapped his head away from Ace. "I can't move forward if I'm dreaming this kind of stuff!"

"What stuff?" Another voice asked.

Luffy whipped around, coming face to face with a man who looked vaguely familiar. However, in that split second Luffy couldn't put his finger on it.

The new blonde whistled. "Wow! You really do look just like Luffy, save the scar on your chest."

Luffy's counterpart lit up. "Sabo! You're back!"

Luffy felt his eyes widen like saucers. Sabo, but adult Sabo. This was a first. The rubber teen sniffed and he felt his eyes begin to burn with tears, which was stupid, because this was a dream and they weren't really there. However, Luffy really wanted to enjoy it. These dreams were some of the only times he got to see their faces and imagine what life could have been like. . . but that's why he couldn't embrace the dream. In dwelling on the past he wouldn't be able to look towards the future. He needed to wake up.

Using a haki coated hand, Luffy suddenly slapped himself in the face. It stung, but he was still there so he raised it again.

"What are you doing?!" Ace shouted.

Sabo grabbed his arm before he could stubbornly try to hit himself again.

"I need to wake up!" Luffy exclaimed, struggling against the blonde.

"You are awake!" Other-Luffy insisted.

"Nuh uh! I'm still dreaming!" Luffy retorted.

Suddenly, Luffy's counterpart punched him in the face, and Luffy flew backwards into a table. He hissed in pain as he stumbled back up. "Ow! Why'd you do that?!"

"See? You're awake," his counterpart stated.

Luffy's eyes widened in realization. He could feel pain, and clearly too. Luffy had never felt pain that real in his dreams before.

"I guess I am," Luffy uttered. He gazed up at Ace, a slightly edgy look on the man's face. "So, you're real?"

Ace scoffed. "I don't think I'm imaginary."

All at once, Luffy felt the tears finally begin well up and spill over. Ace was here. Ace was real. Ace was— "You're alive."

Seemingly without prompting, Luffy launched himself at his brother, bawling all the while. The latter caught him in surprise, his eyes widening in realization as he held this different Luffy closer. "...You thought I was dead?"

Luffy wailed incomprehensibly into Ace's shoulder. The older sibling patted his back awkwardly, looking over at Sabo for guidance.

The blonde shook his head. "I don't know."

At the sound of his other brother's voice, Luffy turned his head back to meet Sabo's gaze. Luffy's breath hitched and he started crying harder. He stretched out his arm and wrapped it around the blonde, yanking him into the hug.

Sabo didn't resist and looked at Luffy warily while trying to comfort the alternate version of their baby brother; he generically reassured the teen that they were right there with him.

Other-Luffy looked on blankly, unsure how to feel.

* * *

 **Just as a note, I'm probably not gonna update this super often. I've just done it twice in a row 'cause I'm in that mood, ya know?**

 **Till next time! ~FairyA.**


	3. Burned by my own Mistake

**Right now, I work on this story on and off, but I'm not gonna post any stories as their own thing until I complete them. And also, "blah blah blah, same using story for inspiration note as chapter 2" I'm lazy lol**

* * *

Luffy laughed along with his crew as they celebrated. After all, they had finally done it; they'd found the One Piece, completed his dream. He was the Pirate King!

Of course, Raftel had been home to lots of gold and other treasures, but the real cool stuff were the mysterious trinkets few and far between. One such item had been a closed clamshell that was hot to the touch. Luffy was drawn to the object, saying it looked like fire, but also, there was something more. And so, like he had been doing since he found it, Luffy idly looked at the shell while sitting out on deck.

"Oi Luffy," Zoro suddenly said, startling his captain.

"Zoro!" Luffy greeted, looking up at him from the ground, shell still in hand.

"You've been looking at that thing a lot. Don't think about it too hard."

Luffy pouted. "Shut up."

"Like hell," Zoro scoffed. "What's so interesting about it anyways?"

"I don't know," Luffy answered, shrugging. "It just feels important."

"Maybe there's something inside," Zoro suggested, leaning up against the rail.

Luffy blinked in surprise. Why didn't he think of that?

"Then I'm gonna break it open," he announced.

Without waiting for any sort of reply, Luffy gripped the shell with both his hands and pulled. With less resistance than he expected, the shell came apart with a quick snap.

And then everything went white.

Luffy whipped his head back and forth. "Ah, Zoro! Where'd you go?"

A voice suddenly rang with in The Pirate King's mind. "You called upon me. What is your wish?"

"My wish?" Luffy asked, dumbfounded. "Who are you? _Where_ are you?"

There was a beat of silence before the voice spoke again. "I see. You wish for your brother's life."

Luffy froze before frowning. "Get out of my head jerk!"

The temperature suddenly rose. "State your wish aloud. I will grant it."

Luffy paused, suddenly (and unusually) thoughtful. "So, wait, you can make it so that Ace lived?"

"I can."

Luffy felt excitement and disbelief build up inside of him. "Then do it now!"

"Very well, but you should learn to mind your manners around strangers."

"Wh—"

And then everything went dark.

* * *

The boy grinned as he looked up at Marco. "Pigeon!"

The blonde raised an eyebrow at him. That was a new one. Of all the nicknames Marco had been called over the years, the ones he had heard from Luffy during the past five had to be the most creative.

Luffy suddenly looked thoughtful for a second before he blurted out. "Wait no! You're a green pigeon!"

Well, Marco was officially dumbfounded. ". . . Why?"

"Because!" Luffy exclaimed. "When you're a birdy you're blue and yellow, which makes green! Izo taught me that!"

Thatch, who had been chuckling off to the side since this whole thing started (honestly Luffy could make the chef laugh for hours), suddenly doubled over laughing. Marco couldn't really fathom why though, because Luffy's nicknames were more strange than hilarious.

"Ah, Marco!" Luffy asked, dropping the name. "Did I tell you about the dream I had last night?"

"No, I don't believe you did."

Luffy grinned. "Well, I was sailing on this _biiiiig_ ship with my mystery crew and we were trying to get away from the guy throwing cannonballs at us! They were so big and fast, but I wasn't even a bit scared!" Luffy puffed out his chest proudly.

Marco smirked. "Not even a little bit?"

Luffy pouted. "Okay, well maybe a _tiny_ bit, but it wasn't just 'cause of the cannonballs!"

"Really? What from then?"

"I dunno."

Marco sighed and Thatch, would had finally managed to get a hold of himself, snorted.

"Wait!" Luffy suddenly asked. "What's a grandpa?"

The two commanders stared down at the kid in bemusement, before Marco answered. "It's your dad's dad."

Luffy face scrunched up, frowning. "So that guy was Pops' dad?"

Thatch tittered and Marco sighed in exasperation. "Probably not."

"But I called him Grandpa!" Luffy said indignantly.

Thatch gave him a fond smile. "You see Luffy, it doesn't have to make sense since it's a dream."

Luffy's eyes widened in understanding. "Oh! I get it now!"

Thatch grinned. "Good! So. . . want something to eat?"

"Yes!" Luffy exclaimed, immediately heading for the dinning hall.

"You know," Marco started, "If you keep offering that blackhole food, we're all going to end up going hungry."

"But doing that makes him say that I'm his favorite!" Thatch pouted. "And don't even try to tell me that you wouldn't want him to say that to you!"

Marco rolled his eyes, but he couldn't deny that Luffy had captured every one of the Whitebeards' hearts.

* * *

The first time that Luffy had a nightmare was when he was nine. He was traversing a prison; it was one filled with fire, ice, screams and a sense of absolute urgency. If he didn't hurry, _they_ would be taken away. Luffy didn't know who _they_ was, only that _they_ was the most important person on the face of the world.

The dream didn't last long, however. Luffy woke up in a cold sweat and with the pressing urge to hurry not leaving his mind. He bolted over to the person who had stolen him to bunk with for the night.

"IZO!" He wailed.

The cross-dresser shot up, all the while still in a half asleep stupor. "What?"

"We have to go save them!" Luffy insisted, now bawling.

Izo blinked. "Who. . .?"

Luffy felt the tears come harder. "I don't know!"

Quickly shaking himself out of half-consciousness, Izo pulled Luffy up onto the cot and began rubbing his back soothingly. "Hey, don't worry Luffy. It was only a nightmare."

"But! But—!"

"Sure, it might have seemed scary then, and you're scared now, but you don't have to be. This person you want to save, isn't in danger anymore. When you woke up, you saved them."

Luffy sniffled, looking over at the 16th division commander. "Really?"

"Yeah," Izo promised. "So you don't need to cry anymore, okay?"

Luffy nodded, wiping at his tears. As long as _that person_ was safe, everything would be okay.

* * *

 **Also, I'm sure you could figure as to what happened here, but if you're confused or want some of the details that aren't in this bit, feel free to ask! ~FairyA.**


	4. Is it Okay?

**Soo, this is a tiny, fluffy SaboLu fic. If you don't like that, sorry** **¯\\_(._.)_/¯ —" _But anyway, there most likely won't be anymore SaboLu after this 'cause (1) It's the only one I have written/an idea for and (2) Ik most people don't like it. However, if you do enjoy, I greatly appreciate it :)"— 6/12/18_ Okay, so I said that last night, but a reviewer has made me want to write more and if I get more SaboLu ideas I'm gonna post them because they're adorable and I love it (I just have to actually start thinking of stuff first lol). However, I'm not gonna make all my stories SaboLu, because I like no pairing stories a lot too (So it's SaboLu or nothing basically).**

* * *

Sabo blinked slowly as he woke up, before almost immediately becoming aware of the fact that he had a hangover. The blonde groaned. He didn't remember much of the night before, sans a few fleeting memories of pleasure. Had he hooked up with someone?

He rolled over, and was not so surprised to see another person laying next to him. Sabo was a little stunned at how slender (and yet somehow also toned) the black-haired person was. He gingerly reached forward and ran a finger down the guy's spine, causing the raven to shiver for a second. Sabo smirked before the blankets suddenly flew up in the air. The blonde let out an unmanly yelp while his partner for the night lurched forward and kissed him in the confusion. They fell backwards, the other now on top of Sabo. The blonde opened his eyes and immediately noted that the man was in fact a teen.

But then he also noticed a little, two-stitch, scar under the young man's left eye and he froze. Oh shit.

"Luffy. . ." he breathed.

Sabo was unable to keep the horror out of his voice, because—holy shit—the gorgeous person who just kissed him, who he had _sex_ with, was, in fact, his baby brother.

Luffy cocked his head to the side. "What?"

"You're— I mean I'm— Oh god." Sabo buried his burning face in his hands.

"Tell meee!" Luffy whined, sitting up, still in all his naked glory.

The teen was hot and, dear Lord, Sabo wanted to just give up and go live in a cave for the rest of his life. Ace would have torn him into bite sized pieces! How could he have just thought that?! Let alone do what he did!

"My name's Sabo," the blonde mumbled.

Luffy huffed. "Yeah, I know, you told me last night!"

Sabo looked up at him in utter bemusement. "Then why'd you have sex with me?!"

Luffy's eyes widened with realization. "So _that_ was sex!"

"You didn't know?!" Sabo wailed.

The teen shook his head. "Nope! But Sanji talked 'bout it sometimes! He said it felt really good and he wasn't lying!"

"But my name. . ."

"Why would it matter that you have the same name as someone I cared about?" Luffy asked, cocking his head.

 _Oh. So he doesn't know. That's great. Perfect._

Sabo felt his face begin to positively burn. "No, I meant that. . . I-I'm your Sabo. The one you swore an oath of _brotherhood_ with."

Luffy's eyes widened comically before he suddenly went on the defensive. "Nuh uh! Don't make stuff up, jerk!"

"I'm being serious Luffy! I'm _alive_!" And, oh God, Sabo really wasn't sure if that was a good thing.

Luffy scowled at him, tears prickling in the corners of his eyes. "I don't believe you!"

"Ace and the two of us stole sake from Dadan and—"

Luffy's eyes bugged out comically as the floodgates bursted wide open. "SABO!?"

The teen's eyes suddenly seemed to inspect every inch of Sabo, innocently though, as if to see just how much he changed. However, that didn't mean that Sabo didn't want to evaporate under his burning gaze. _Right now, please._

And then Luffy suddenly tackled him, snot and tears going everywhere. "You're alive! You're really really aliiive!"

The teen hugged him tightly, burying his face in the blonde's shoulder. Despite the flush that rushed once more to his cheeks, Sabo managed to give his baby brother an apologetic smile.

"Where have you been all this time?! I thought you were dead!" Luffy sobbed.

What could he say that wouldn't make Luffy feel bad for him? What could he do to help the younger, even a little? ". . .Thank you Luffy," he said softly. "Thank you for being alive."

Luffy's breath hitched. "But, Sabo, I—I let Ace die right in front of me!"

Sabo rubbed the raven's back soothingly. "I know. . . but even still, I'm so glad that you're alive. I almost lost both of you without even having a chance to help. If you'd died, I'd be all alone."

Luffy let out a wail in between his mess of sobs and Sabo sat there to comfort him. He would do so for as long as Luffy needed.

* * *

"I'm sorry for last night. . ." Sabo finally murmured. "We can pretend it didn't happen."

His brother wiped at his teary eyes and frowned. "Why?"

"Luffy, we had _sex_. Siblings don't _do_ that kind of thing. It's for couples. . . ."

Luffy nodded blankly. "Yeah, I know, but we aren't related. Also, you grew up to be really pretty."

Sabo sputtered in surprise and he felt his face go completely red, only for Luffy to then peck him on the cheek without warning; Sabo felt his heart flutter and he buried his face in his hands.

Luffy giggled—eyes finally dry—before flashing him an adorable grin. "And now the really beautiful guy I met last night is someone I already love! So this is perfect."

The blonde gingerly peaked through his fingers. "You, and your also beautiful, stupid face, are gonna be the death of me, you know that?"

The younger just laughed brightly.


	5. What's one More Loop?

**Okay, so this is a little preview to a story I'm writing right now (not sure how long it'll take, but I'm working on it. Though I am stuck between two different versions of the story atm). It's gonna be an angsty as hell time looping story, I'm sorry. Also, Luffy will probably be OOC, because it is so freaking hard to write angsty, broken Luffy. However, I'm going to try my damnedest to figure it out!**

* * *

God, he just wanted it to be over.

He'd been through this prison so many damn times. Once for every. Single. Mistake.

Each wall in the prison he knew intimately. He'd been caught by every surveillance snail. He'd died in every room by someone's hand, often his own. He thought maybe he had actually grown attached to it, after all, he'd been in this place longer than anywhere else after all.

But even still, Luffy wanted to be able to say goodbye to this underwater hellhole.

As he approached his brother once again, Luffy reached through the bars and tapped Ace lightly. His brother's head jerked up in surprise and Luffy put his hand over Ace's mouth. The younger brother forcefully put a finger to his own lips, because he had stopped taking any chances a while ago. He waited until Ace slowly nodded, looking at Luffy with horror and bemusement evident on his face. Luffy ignored that, he'd seen that expression so many times, and slowly removed his hands; he promptly undid the locks on all of Ace's chains. Finding the keys was practically as easy as finding his own hand by this point.

He opened the door, almost dragging Ace out as he casted a glance back towards Jimbei. He didn't want to leave his crewmate behind, but Jimbei was capable and he would not die if he stayed here. . . unlike what happens when he goes with Luffy—which will not be happening again, please not ever again.

Luffy noticed Ace eyeing him, obviously wanting answers. God, he wanted to tell him. He craved comfort so much that it hurt. He was dying for his big brother to hold him, tell him it would be alright, even if it would just be a lie. . . but he couldn't do it. He could never do it. That would mean death, and not just for him.


End file.
